User blog:RRabbit42/Low-cost way of getting the Johnny Test episodes
I had stopped in at an electronics store a few days ago and decided to take a look through the DVDs they had available. In there, I spotted one for Johnny Test: The Complete Fifth Season that was priced at $6.99 and decided to pick it up. It turns out, this is a really good bargain for purchasing the episodes. If you have a subscription to Netflix, you can watch the episodes online and I presume you can also on Amazon Prime since they sell the episodes. Though they are making it easier to watch TV shows online on more devices and you can find episodes on video sites like YouTube, you are dependent on that company or that site having the episode available when you want to watch it. Netflix typically only has TV shows available for a certain amount of time before they are cycled out. It's likely the same with Amazon Prime, Hulu and others. To ensure that you can watch the episodes when you want to, the best way is to purchase them. It's convenient to do that through iTunes, Amazon Prime or a local cable company such as Comcast. But again, that is making you dependent upon another company for providing the means to watch them. Enter the DVDs. I have always bought TV shows and movies on DVD or Blu-ray whenever possible. I like the fact that you get some nice artwork with the packaging and usually some bonus features. In rare occasions, you get a group that really cares and loves putting the discs together, such as the ones for The Simpsons, which featured custom menus for each disc in the box set and a lot of bonus features and commentaries. This Johnny Test set did not include any of that and the episodes are in standard definition (SD), though other DVD sets do include bonus content or episodes The price more than makes up for both, and it turns out that DVDs are the best bargain for purchasing the episodes if you don't need the high definition (HD) versions. Here's why. The standard pricing per episode for any TV series on iTunes and Amazon Prime is about $1.99 per episode if it's in SD and $2.99 if it's in HD. For a season of 13 SD episodes, that's $25.87, and for 26 SD episodes, that would be $51.74. They give you a break for buying the entire season, so one season of 13 episodes cost $19.99 and $34.99 for a season with 26 episodes. That's a pretty good bargain, dropping the price down to $1.54 and $1.35 per episode, respectively. But you have to be careful. Apple had a really bad habit in the past of splitting up a season of episodes into a fixed amounnt (usually 13) to make it more appealing to buy, but they would call it a "season" or a "volume". So in order to get the same number of episodes that is in the actual season of a TV show, you'd have to buy two or more "seasons" or "volumes". Further complicating it, occasionally an episode was not available to purchase. With the Johnny Test DVDs, each season is an actual season, and the price per episode is even better. In the table below, an episode is defined as a 22-minute broadcast, rather than individual episodes like "Johnny Goes Nuts" and "Johnny Daddy Day". So right there, the DVDs are a really good bargain. It gets better if you buy the box set with Seasons 1 through 5: Right now, Amazon.com has the best price for this set, so that brings the costs down to this: So until Season 6 is released and the invitable Season 1-6 box set, buying the DVDs from Amazon.com is the most cost-effective way of getting the episodes. But what if you want to play them on your iPod, iPad or Android device? There are ways to get a DVD's contents into a format that will work with those. I'll leave it up to you to find those out for yourself if you're interested, but keep in mind that DVDs and Blu-ray discs don't have the same rules for making backups/archival copies that music CDs and computer programs do. Just be gentle with the discs and you'll be all right. Category:Blog posts Category:Community news